Many garments, particularly disposable garments such as disposable diapers, rely on releasable touch fasteners, such as hook-and-loop fasteners, to secure the garment on a wearer. Many disposable diapers, for example, have diaper tabs with patches of male touch fasteners that engage a central patch of loop material secured to the front face of the outer cover of the diaper to hold the diaper on a small child. Some have suggested providing outer diaper covers with secondary patches of loop material to engage the tabs when the soiled diaper is ready for disposal. The loop material has fibrous loops of a strength and configuration for being snagged by the male touch fasteners and withstanding a reasonable amount of peel and shear forces while engaged.
A typical disposable diaper has a multi-layer chassis that includes a permeable inner cover adjacent the baby's skin, an outer cover that faces away from the baby, and a layer of absorbent material sandwiched between the two. Urine permeates through the inner cover to be absorbed in the absorbent material. The outer cover is typically of an impermeable material, and may be a laminate of an impermeable substrate, such as a plastic film, and an inexpensive non-woven fabric with very low loft and fairly low fiber tenacity, with the non-woven fabric on the outside of the diaper for feel and aesthetics.
Improvements in the structure of diapers, other garments and fibrous materials in general, are sought, particularly improvements that may lead to reduced garment costs.